The idea that someone might have shaved them for me while I was out cold gave me the heebie-jeebies. If that were the case, I wasn’t sure I ever wanted my memory back.
After showering, I’d tentatively reached out to touch the steamed mirror, whisking away the condensation so I could see better, looking at that other me through the damp halo. The me staring back was the same me I’d seen every day for as long as I could remember. There’d never been anything remarkable about me, unless you counted my eyes, which I’d always thought were crazy big for my face, and the freckles that splashed across my nose, making me look younger than I was. Something no teen ever wanted.
I’d never been like Cat, with her shockingly blond hair that grew that way straight from her head rather than coming from a bottle, and her exotic-shaped eyes that she accented with jet-black eyeliner, and a pointed chin that she always held high, giving her a badass vibe. The kind of vibe I’d always wanted but could never pull off because grandmothers wanted to pinch my cheeks and give me a quarter for being so adorable.
I’d spent forever staring in the mirror, studying myself for evidence of changes or nonchanges. It was harder than I’d expected, to dissect myself like that, and that same woozy sense of déjà vu hovered over me, like I was having some sort of freaky out-of-body experience.
I stopped walking when I found myself in front of our neighborhood park. Like me, it looked the same as it always had. Standard-issue park stuff, really: slides, swings, sandbox, grass.
The lights all around me were off for the night since it was way past curfew, yet I could see everything I needed to see. I knew this place like the back of my hand. It was the perfect place to be alone, and I hopped the short fence, wondering who it was possibly meant to keep out since I was practically tall enough to step over it, and then realized it probably wasn’t meant to keep anyone out at all. It was designed to keep small children inside. It was like a kid corral.
The swings were near the tree line, and beneath them there was sand so that if you fell, you’d land in the soft powder instead of scrape a knee, or crush a skull.
Mostly, I think neighborhood cats liked to pee in it, though.
Austin and I used to swing as high, and as fast, as we could and then jump, measuring to see which of us had landed the farthest. That was, of course, before all the kissing had started.
From that point on the park had become an after-dark hideaway where we’d curled up among the turrets of the jungle gym or in the tunnels as we’d practiced and practiced and practiced on each other. Making sure we got that whole kissing thing just right.
I sat in one of the swings, suffocated by memories as I wrapped my fingers around the chain and kicked my legs. Maybe the park hadn’t been such a great idea after all.
Moving back and forth, I tried to let my mind go blank. I pushed higher and higher in the air, leaning my head back and watching as the stars blurred together.
“You’re a supernova, Kyra. Someday you’ll burn so bright none of us will even be able to look at you.” My dad always used to say things like that with a chuckle, right before he said something like “No pain, no gain” while reminding me to keep practicing or telling me that I needed to straighten out my pitch. Or sometimes he’d just reach over and brush away a stray hair and tell me how beautiful I was.
Dads say things like that sometimes.
Said, I thought, squeezing my eyes shut and sitting upright once more. Sometimes they said things like that. I wasn’t sure what kinds of things my dad said anymore.
Behind me, I heard a sound, a shifting or rustling in the trees that bordered the park. The place where Cat and I always imagined creepy pervs hung out in their raincoats, watching the little kiddies play on the teeter-totters.
I turned sharply in the swing, the chains twisting together as I strained to see into the craggy shadows that filled the space between the trunks and shrubs and thick layer of ferns that choked the ground.
I waited, holding my breath as I listened. The back of my neck prickled as I scanned, unable to stop searching, unable to let go of that strange feeling of being watched.
I should leave, I finally decided when my heart refused to slow, even when I couldn’t pinpoint anything to be afraid of, other than my overactive imagination. Five years hadn’t changed the fact that I could still freak myself out in the dark.
As I got up, the swing jerked against the backs of my legs, rotating first one way and then the other as the chains worked to right themselves once more. Suddenly I didn’t feel safe out here, in the park in the middle of the night, all by myself, and I wondered what I’d been thinking coming here.
I was just about to go, pivoting in the soft sand beneath my feet, when I saw him standing there, near the entrance to the park.
“What are you doing here?”
“Sorry,” Tyler offered, taking an uncertain step back. “I didn’t mean to scare you. It’s just that I saw you take off this way and thought that maybe you shouldn’t be out here alone. I don’t want to intrude or anything, but . . .” He cocked his head to the side as a slow smile slid over his face. “I can’t in good conscience leave you out here by yourself.”
I glanced around at the deserted playground. “You afraid some bully might push me down or something?” I grinned, and it felt like the first time I’d really smiled since I’d been back. I sat down again on the swing, keeping my eyes on Tyler, disappointed that he’d decided to wear a shirt this time.